Two ways of thinking about social media: digital tattoos and virtual shadowsAt concerts, lighters once swayed in the air during poignant moments, the audience belting out lyrics together in a moment of catharsis. Today, the group sing-alongs still happen, but the air shines with a different glow: the light of cell phones. Last week, while seeing a favorite band, I couldn’t help but notice the sea […]
When our private lives become public online … will it make us more or less tolerant?“I’m not arguing that this stuff shouldn’t exist,” says Juan Enriquez. “I’m saying that precisely because this stuff is so powerful, we should be careful and think about what we’re doing, instead of treating it like a lark, thinking if we post something at 2am that no one will care.” The Boston-based entrepreneur and many-time […]
Writing on Darwin’s 200th birthday last week, Lise Buyer offered this commentary about today’s TEDTalk, Juan Enriquez’ “How Mind-Boggling Science Will Outlast the Crisis.” From the story: … In his talk at TED, Enriquez said the fact that we are the only living species of humans is an anomaly — or at least out of […]
“Juan Enriquez” “night vision” “robot horses”
Here’s a persuasive op-ed in today’s Boston Globe co-authored by regular TED speaker Juan Enriquez … uttering a word neither candidate dare utter: WITHIN THE billions of sentences about the financial bailout there is one word notably absent, austerity. All talk is of payments, supports, subsidies, incurring more debt, stimulus packages. The thesis seems to […]
WIRED‘s Thomas Goetz fumes about a development in the world of genetic testing: California health regulators have demanded that several genetic testing start-ups halt operations until they prove they meet quality and reliability standards. Goetz writes, To my mind, genetic information is a new sort of personal information that the state and even the physician […]
Many TEDTalks speakers have answered the 2008 Edge Foundation question: What have you changed your mind about? Why? Among the more than 160 essays from leading thinkers — scientists, philosophers, artists — look for Wired’s Chris Anderson, Nick Bostrom, Stewart Brand, Richard Dawkins, Aubrey de Grey, Juan Enriquez, Helen Fisher, Neil Gershenfeld, Daniel Gilbert, Daniel […]
Biologist and futurist Juan Enriquez talks about the potential of bioenergy. Our current energy sources — coal, oil, gas — are ultimately derived from ancient plants — they’re “concentrated sunlight.” He asks, Can we learn from that process and accelerate it? Can we get to the point where we grow our own energy as efficiently […]
News.com’s blog reports on how much oil we have left, in the estimate of Chevron CTO Don Paul: About 1 trillion gallons that we can extract, and another trillion that, for now, we can’t. In a hallway conversation with a News.com reporter, Chevron’s Paul estimated that we will have consumed half of all the oil […]
Some selected source material and references from Wednesday night’s TED Salon: David Keith (pictured, left) showed a New York Times editorial on the coming climate change — from May 24, 1953: How Industry May Change ClimateThe amount of carbon dioxide in the air will double by the year 2080 and raise the temperature an average […]
Last night in New York City, 250 TEDsters gathered to hear some radical proposals for outsmarting climate change. It’s a fact: Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are rising, and with them the possibility of severe climate change within our lifetimes. Increasingly, scientists are considering extreme measures that can quickly suck CO2 out of the atmosphere to […]
Last night in Manhattan, TED hosted its 2007 Salon, called “Hot Science: Radical Ideas to Combat the Climate Crisis.” A detailed roundup is coming later today — but first, a few quotes from last night: The first speaker, Michael Oppenheimer, began by saying: “I’m the depressing, immobilizing part of the talk.” He went on to […]
Scientific discoveries, futurist Juan Enriquez notes, demand a shift in code, and our ability to thrive depends on our mastery of that code. Here, he applies this notion to the field of genomics.
